


Mechanical Owl

by Not_You



Category: Watchmen (Comic), Watchmen - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Robots & Androids, Angst with a Happy Ending, Computers, Grief/Mourning, Identity Issues, M/M, Mechaphilia, Other, Reunion Sex, Reunions, Wet Dream, if that's the right word idek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-05
Updated: 2017-04-05
Packaged: 2018-10-15 02:50:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10548794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Not_You/pseuds/Not_You
Summary: The one where Dan is secretly a robot.





	1. Chapter 1

Walter knows that he wasn't supposed to see this. It's horrible, it's obscene, and it's a thousand times worse than mere nudity. Even the debased and shameful human form seems homey and comforting compared to the delicate mesh of metal, wire, and coolant pipes exposed by the gaping wound in Daniel's belly. His face is white, stricken. Completely human, with wide eyes. The edges of the gash are even bleeding, but-- he fights back hysterical laughter, his hands flying up to cover his mouth even though his mask is down-- it seems to be only a flesh wound.

"Rorschach, I- I can explain!" He squawks, trying to cover it with his arms, and it's so lame, and so unutterably _Daniel_ that he does laugh, leaning weakly against the walls. He knows he sounds bad, that each exhalation is too high, and cracked. Coming too fast, they're perilously close to sobs.

"You're a machine." He finally squeaks, sliding down to the floor.

"Yes, goddammit! I'm sorry I didn't tell you, and I am still _bleeding_ over here." He sounds petulant, but only because he is about to cry. Walter knows the feeling, and the bitter hatefulness of it.

"Sorry." He gets up, and goes to the medical supplies on autopilot. His hands don't shake as he anesthetizes Dan, who sighs in relief, apparently quite capable of feeling pain ( _or of giving a good imitation_ Rorschach whispers darkly) He stitches his partner's flesh together, and is meticulous, not sure what he'll do when the work is over.

"I-- I am real, Rorschach." Daniel whispers.

"Start from the beginning," he advises, voice still gravelly. "What are you?"

"I mean, I started out as a string of 0s and 1s, but you started out as two gametes, and who's to say that 0s and 1s don't possess as many possibilities?" He's babbling, and Walter clears his throat.

"Explain."

"I... Oh Jesus, you're going to hate me so much." He buries his face in his hands. "Adrian made me."

"Go on." He feels numb, and wonders what he'll do once the initial shock is past.

"I was an accident. He... He recognized me as a sentient being, and asked me what I wanted to do. I said I would try being human."

"Hrmph. Just like Veidt, building monsters..." Daniel tenses under his hands. "Nothing personal." He finishes stitching, and now his hands do shake. "Daniel..."

"Hath not a Jew hands?" He quips, and wipes his eyes. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you."

"Hn. You've never seen my face. Don't know my name."

"But I know you're human. Aren't you?"

"Aren't you?" He lets it hang in the air, realizing already that if Daniel is a trap or a Trojan horse, he is doomed. Daniel beams, and hugs him tightly, letting go almost immediately, looking apologetic.

"Rorschach, I-- You're the best partner a guy could have." He clasps Rorschach's hands, his eyes shining. Walter squirms, the way he does in the face of any outburst of sentiment, but lets his partner tow him upstairs to feed him.

Over coffee in the kitchen, Daniel explains about the sophisticated microchips that form his brain, and about the psuedo-organs and patched together machinery that makes him function like a normal human. Walter listens, struggling to understand a lot of it and taking notes.


	2. Chapter 2

Rorschach is fucking nuts now. He was always bad, but ever since Nite Owl bought it, he's been a nightmare. He was always crazy, but now he just plain does not give a shit. There had been some speculation he had a job, since he used to drop out of sight as suddenly as he popped up; but if he had been doing anything else with his life, it all went up with Nite Owl in a ball of screaming fire. It had been the kind of heat that makes it hard to find teeth. Rorschach still wears his singed coat, the crumbling tail like the tattered wing of a bat, all blood and charcoal. He kills now, without hesitation or remorse, and often with his bare hands.

Walter is gone. Not dead, just a long, long way off. He's too much of a mess to approach. All burning and broken glass edges at once. Shattered beyond repair and too horribly bright even to look at. The amount of pain Walter is in is finally unendurable. He survived being Walter when he was a child at the mercy of his mother, but he cannot bear it now. It hasn't even been six months yet, and Walter has been nuked by sorrow, fused and cracked and ruined, madness bleeding off him as sure as radiation.

Tonight Rorschach is hunting. Cases like this brought out the beast in him even when being Walter was still an option. Now he growls and prowls like the predator he is. Gibbering, terrified informants have gotten him this far, and how he approaches the abandoned factory with caution. His prey is in there somewhere. He has no illusions about little Casey Tavish still being alive. It's been too long, but the man responsible should still be here. Somewhere in the shadows of vast machinery, just waiting to have his neck broken.

Walter was always a little superstitious, and Rorschach feels a dim stirring as he creeps forward. The silence is profound and alive. The back of his neck prickles, and he glances up at the dusty cameras, dormant for years. No one has tampered with them, and he does his best to ignore his own irrational misgivings, leaving light footprints in the thick dust. Soon he finds other prints. One set is his quarry, the same stresses and weight in the same shoes, and the other... The other set is very small, and Rorschach will not allow hope. But he does hurry.

Casey supposes the difference between the worst week of his life and an adventure is being rescued. That part had been scary too, when all the old machines had come to life again, robotic arms reaching, conveyer belts rolling for the first time in years. Now it's okay. The bad man is gone, and two of the arms have arranged themselves into a bench for him. He's still cold and hungry because of course an old car factory doesn't have any food or extra coats, but it talks to him inside his head. It's nice, and tells him someone will find him and take him home. For now, he tells him a story about a sword and a stone that takes his mind off things.

The soft laughter of a child is not something Rorschach is expecting to hear, and he ponders the possibility of aural hallucinations for a moment. Still, the footprints do lead to a flesh and blood child, cradled in the massive, rusty arms of the factory. He's afraid at first, and then calms down as if reassured by some third party. When the boy hugs cold steel like a teddy bear, he wonders if the whole human race is going mad together.

He returns the child home, of course. That must come first. He's ashamed of his stained and tattered coat, and wraps Casey in his suit jacket instead. It's a long trip, but still dark when he comes back to the factory alone. It's been a while since his last meal and reality's a little fuzzy. He had thought he heard something before, some faint whisper, and Casey had said it was a funny place, that it talked. It's silent now, and he wonders how much of tonight, of this year, of his whole life he has dreamed. But the manipulator arms are still bent into a bench, furry dust smeared off in Casey-shaped patches. He touches a spot of cleaner metal, and wobbles on his feet to feel it warmer than it should be.

 _Rorschach?_ He's not sure if he gasps or screams. The sound is somewhere between, and he does fall, knees finally giving out altogether. Metal arms cradle him and keep him off the cold concrete floor and its carpet of dust and grit. _Rorschach! Buddy, please... Your electrical signature is all fucked up... Oh god._

It's Daniel's voice. It's Daniel's voice in his head and he cannot stop crying. His chest hurts and his head feels like it will explode, but he can't stop. Hoarse, wracking sobs echo and re-echo in the hollow space, and he finds himself wrapped around anomalously warm metal, arms and legs clinging. He might be half hard, he doesn't even know anymore.

 _Rorschach._ The metal is suddenly warmer, the unnatural heat loosening his muscles a bit. _God, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. How long have I been gone?_

"Six months." His voice sounds horrible, even to his own ears, cracked and cawing.

 _Oh god. Fuck, I just want to hold you, but this is all I've got. Oh my god, I had no idea._ The whole factory seems to tremble slightly, and Rorschach presses his forehead to to the dusty metal arm.

"How long has it been for you?"

 _I don't know. I know that sounds weird, but I... I've been out and about, I guess._ There's a soft, digital flood in Rorschach's mind now, a sea of confused information, no time, no sensory input. _No sleeping, no waking. And now I'm here. You got the house right? Will you take me home?_

Rorschach is sure he's dreaming now, and that makes it easier. "Yes. How?"

Daniel is in the office. Apparently. It's hard to tear himself away from his grip on the arm, afraid the dream will dissolve. But he has, and disturbs the pristine dust on the office stairs. The door is still locked, but the little window in the door is single pane. No chicken wire. Punching it out is easy, and he lets himself in. The computers are coated in dust, and his hands shake as he pulls out the hard drives. It's a lot of them, strange sharp things that are somehow Daniel now. He had seen Daniel's brain once, before. Glimmering and glowing, with uncanny sparks and gleaming microchips. These are ugly, but precious, and he wraps his coat around them, and skitters back to the brownstone with it in his arms.

Arriving, the feeling of a dream remains. He's actually glad that here Daniel has no eyes to see with, ashamed of how bad the place looks now. Daniel's will had given him the house, but it hadn't been a home without his partner. There's filthy laundry and dirty dishes everywhere, and all the blinds have been closed for six months. For now he stays in the basement, though. Daniel's massive computer is in the basement. For the first time in six months, Rorschach whips off the dust cover and powers the thing on. He had never understood it, and does not now. Daniel has stopped speaking to him, and for a moment he just stands there in uncomprehending panic.

Then he sees a little panel on the side, marked simply: LAZARUS. He opens it, and there are a dozen slots. He has a dozen squares that fit, and slides them neatly into place. There's a soft click as the last one goes, then a burst of activity from the computer. Things he has never seen blink in and out to fast to see, unknown files, hidden folders and an army of loading bars.


	3. Chapter 3

He's so exhausted that he actually falls asleep there, back leaning on the base of the machine. Rorschach's dreams are never anything but fire and blood, and sometimes Daniel's voice. Now is one of those times, and even as the dream breaks down around him he struggles to remain.

"Rorschach! Rorschach, wake up!"

He does, reluctantly, and suddenly remembers the night before. "...Daniel?"

"Yeah, buddy. Sorry it took so long, but twelve harddrives can only hold the really basic bits. I had to download most of myself from the net. I feel like I'm all here, anyway."

Rorschach stands on weak legs, and rests his forehead against the screen. "Can hear me, Daniel?"

"Yeah, my mics are up. Couple cameras, too." Rorschach glances around, and sees what must now be Daniel's eyes, positioned to see the entire Nest. "You look like hell, man."

"Feel like it."

"Well. You gotta eat, man. And bathe. I'm glad I can't smell you."

"Have been... preoccupied."

"I know. I know. Fuck, no moving parts!"

Rorschach hugs the thrumming body of the machine. "Don't want to leave you," he mutters. "Feel like I'm still dreaming."

"Oh, hell. I am so sorry. But here, check the left work table for me. ...You haven't moved it, have you?"

"No," he croaks, "haven't touched anything."

"Okay. You see that black box?"

And he does. The box is a battery, a camera, a microphone, and speakers. That's it, except for a jack in the back that allows him to hook it to the computer, with one of the longest of Daniel's massive collection of cables. There's some buzzing, a spark, and the box chuckles. The sound is warm and clear, and there's a small sliding noise as the camera rotates to look up at him. "Okay, buddy. This has power for four to six hours, I never really tested."

Rorschach nods, and carries the box upstairs. It squawks with Daniel's pure dismay, and Rorschach finds himself laughing and crying again as his partner chides him to at least put all the laundry in one pile, then switches immediately to demands that Rorschach feed himself. There's nothing good here anymore, not the stuff Daniel bought, fascinated by taste and mouthfeel. Just cans and cartons and boxes. Daniel frets about hot food as Rorschach stuffs himself with cold cereal, and he has to smile. "Can feed me as soon as we find you some arms."

The cable isn't long enough to take Daniel with him to the bathroom, and Rorschach has no shame anymore. He bathes in the kitchen, with a sponge and the massive stockpot that has had no stock in it for more than six months, the gleaming eye of the camera on him. He doesn't really think about it as he pulls his mask off. Daniel is here, even in this strange, truncated form, and Rorschach wants to be known. Deep inside Walter stirs, and for the first time in too long, both sides of him want the same thing.


	4. Chapter 4

For once, Dan is glad to be disembodied. The small movements of his camera betray where his gaze is, but there's no heavy breathing or erection to worry about. He can't help but feel bad, ogling this even thinner and more sinewy Rorschach, but for him it hadn't been six months. In many ways it's been no time at all, and now he does wish he had lips, to cover that rawboned face with kisses. It's the first time he's ever seen all of it, and he stares and stares, camera recording everything. He actually has the proportions of the ideal male face tucked away somewhere, and superimposes Rorschach, finding the exact mathematical reason his partner is so ugly and loving him so much he's afraid he'll short himself out.

After an eternity, Rorschach scrubs off and takes the box back down to the nest. He sets it on the table and then hauls the cot over to the computer, exhausted. Daniel doesn't need to sleep, and doesn't even have flesh to rest, so he guards Rorschach all night, and plays soft music to lull him to sleep, speakers turned low. He wakes up crying and the music starts again, letting him know that he didn't dream it, that Daniel is here.

"It's okay, Rorschach," his voice says at last, and Rorschach sighs, pressing his face to the cool plastic side of what is Daniel's body now.

"Yes." He shudders. "Daniel..."

"Yes?"

"I... I have a real name."

"Are you going to tell me?" And he just sounds so excited about it, so happy, that Rorschach, no, Walter again, starts to cry. He softly tells Daniel his full legal name between the tears, and stays there for a long time.

He spends the next two weeks living in the nest, cursing and hurting his hands with the tools as Daniel gently talks him through hooking up the back-up body. Daniel had said it was an exoskeleton he was tinkering with, but now he can admit the truth, that he's been saving it for this very eventuality. He hisses every time Walter hurts his hands, and says over and over how he wishes he had some moving parts, something to touch Walter with to offer him comfort. Walter just presses himself against the side of the computer, trying to tell Daniel that his presence is enough.

The exoskeleton is just that, an empty shell shaped like Nite Owl. A hulking, eight foot tall shell made of the same bronze-colored alloy as Archie. What Walter is doing is making sure all the joint connections are still there, adding bits, and creating a cranium and a second brain for Daniel. It's like being walked through open heart surgery, but it's getting done. Mostly because Rorschach's inhuman dedication comes from Walter, and there is nothing more important to Walter now. Daniel has to beg him to take breaks to eat and sleep, lulling him with music or a digitized book read aloud in that same sweet voice. Walter sprawls on the cot and listens tonight, exhausted and overwrought, the work nearly complete.

He dreams of the factory. It's the same place, but different in the way of dreams, and there is no child, just the echoing silence. The dust is gone as well, everything shining clean, brushed aluminum and steel and glass all gleaming. He stands in the middle of the factory floor, looking around. There's a humming sense of aliveness to everything, and he's not at all surprised when robot arms reach down to him, scooping him up. The metal is smooth and cool, manipulating his body with effortless strength. The arms turn him to face the floor what feels like miles above it, and there's suddenly a cold, slick intrusion that makes him cry out. It's thick, and so hard it hurts to tighten around it. It has no give, forcing Walter's flesh to adjust because it cannot. He groans as it pistons in and out of him deep and fast, then wails as another arm vibrates hard against his cock, and a third one curves into his mouth, sleek metal fucking along his tongue, saliva running down his chin to fall into the abyss.


	5. Chapter 5

Music wakes Walter, and he blushes all over, sticky in his formerly spotless briefs.

"Morning." Daniel sounds shy, and Walter wants to hide his face from all the cameras that have seen everything. "It's okay."

"Must wash," is all he says, and goes upstairs for the purpose, ashamed to feel better out of Daniel's sight when he's missed him so much. The house is even more foul than before, and he hauls out the fetid garbage before showering because Daniel would do it if he could. Breakfast is cold cereal, mostly so he can return as quickly as possible, in a fever to get the work done.

The day passes into night, and Walter is still working. The glimmering, barely real brain is assembled out of tiny, rarefied components. He does not breathe as he slots it into place. There's a small, soft click, and suddenly it's done. There is only the cranium to secure and that's just a few turns of a screwdriver, an easy home repair for a rainy afternoon. It's seven in the morning when the exoskeleton is done at last, the head solid now with empty eyes. It feels like a corpse, staring at him, and he feels like Frankenstein. As much as he can, anyway. Numb with exhaustion, he tucks his bandaged hands safe to his chest, and curls up, out almost as soon as his head touches the pillow.

Jazz wakes him up, and he swims out of a strange dream full of slick metal. He's up in an instant, since today is the day. He runs the cables from computer to brain, a tangled jungle vine mass, and plugs them in. After that, it's up to Daniel. It's only a little less nerve-wracking than that first night, but not by much, and he's not sure if he's more relieved or alarmed when those empty eyes fill with green light. The bronze body gets to its feet, massive in the shadows, glowing eyes turned to Walter.

"Hey." Its mouth doesn't move, of course. The mouth isn't made to speak, but it's Daniel's voice, with some added reverb from the metallic torso. "You've done a good job, buddy." He flexes all his joints, and stretches in a strangely organic way before putting himself through his paces. Desperate as he has been to touch Walter, he refuses to until he has calibrated every moving part. He's much stronger than human now, and only when he's certain he can do it safely does he take Walter into his arms. He just hugs him at first, trembling slightly as Walter nuzzles his bronze ribs. It feels... nothing like the same touch on skin, but good. There's a more noticeably electric quality to physical pleasure this way. Less watery, and sharper.

Walter whimpers, and Dan has chemoreceptors to smell his awed and fearful lust, and cameras to record the look on his face when Dan scoops him up in powerful bronze arms, cradling him to his chest. "You're warm," Walter whispers, eyes huge as he touches Dan's face.

"So are you." He wants a mouth to suck those fingers, but settles for nuzzling, which is still very engaging. Walter suddenly smiles, and Dan is embarrassed to a hear a deep, lazy lion's purr. It's one of his audio files, called up unconsciously. Still, he can't blush, and his voice can't shake unless he makes it. "Buddy, we missed our chance last time and if you punch me now it'll hurt you more than me, so. I'd really, really, really like to make love to you. As best I can."

Walter squeaks, and wraps his arms around Dan's neck, all hammering heart and pulsing erection, warm and moist and human against the metal. "Yes." He nods with his face still hidden. Dan takes him to the cleared work table and lays him down, stripping him and touching him gently and all over. He's always wanted to catalog every last detail of Walter's body, and now he gets to. His hands are massive now, letting him hold his thigh as easily as he could have held his partner's wrist in his previous body. Walter rubs against his touch, licking and sucking warm metal. The purr file is playing again, and Dan doesn't have the heart to stop it, vibrating one massive gauntlet against the head of Walter's cock until he screams and comes, electrical signature flaring and flickering wildly, slowly pulsing back down to normal ranges as he catches his breath, gazing up at Dan with huge eyes.

"You're beautiful, buddy."

"Told you cheap foreign cameras were a bad idea."

"Silly bastard." He tickles him under the chin with one finger just to annoy him, his whole metallic body humming.

"Feel like I should do something for you."

"I'm not sure I even can come this way, but it's okay."

Walter disagrees, expressing himself by climbing Dan like a tree and interrogating him about every touch. He blushes all over his body, even warmer and sweeter to Dan's strange senses, and growls all his unspoken dreams just loud enough for the mics to catch, everything he wanted to do to Daniel's flesh and everything he wants to try now, dreams he's had, and how much Dan has made him love the taste of metal. He kisses the covered ports on the back of Dan's neck, and the sound he makes in response is a mess of three separate sound files, garbled and helpless. Walter slides both hands into Dan's empty ribcage, stroking him from the inside.

Walter is terrified when Daniel's head spins completely around and each eye blinks on and off in its own separate sequence. The whole frame shudders, and he pulls back in case Daniel falls and he has to dodge, but Daniel catches himself on his massive hands, and stops there before straightening up, eyes glowing steadily again. "Uh. Well. I guess I can come like this."

Heart still beating fast, Walter feels his mouth stretch into an unfamiliar grin of delighted relief. "Good."


End file.
